Leon went down.
Cam laughed and signalled for nearby brothers to drag him out of the ring.
His smile was as mesmerising as Alexei’s sneer.
I lit a cigarette, observing Eric as what he was facing finally dawned on him. Watching as he pictured himself getting decked by one punch and hitting the mat in front of the whole club.
In front of the council.
His president.
The club girls he relied on to get his dick wet.
Couldn’t say which mattered most to him and I didn’t give a fuck.
I could watch Alexei fight all night long.
Fists raised, Eric circled the mat, huge biceps bunching.
Unmoving, Alexei tracked him, his lithe body relaxed and yet thrumming with an energy I wanted to drown myself in. I snatched a breath, hands clenching before I remembered the smoke wedged between my fingers.
Fuck.
I dropped it and folded my arms across my chest, for once deaf to the voice in my head telling me that litter killed the planet.
Eric made his move. He lunged at Alexei, massive fist flying. Alexei skipped out of the way, and it began. A teasing game of feint and lunge. For a big man, Eric was light on his feet, but Alexei was ethereal. He floated around the ring as Eric punched air and the crowd waited for the hammer blow. For the one-punch finale Alexei had already gifted them three times over.
But it didn’t happen. The dance went on and on before Eric snapped and threw his hands in the air with a roar.
“Fucking little faggot. Fight me like a fucking man, or you got a pussy in them tight trousers?”
I laughed, choking out a lungful of smoke and making Rubi jump, then look at me as if I’d sprouted sparkly gold horns. But he didn’t understand. He didn’tknowthat beyond the fact that Alexei’s designer sweatpants weren’t fucking tight, the dude had abigdick.
Thick.
Long.
I was as scared of it as I was of Cam’s.
“Jesus,” Mateo muttered.
I stopped thinking about dick and refocused. Followed Mateo’s twisted stare.
Alexei had stopped moving. He was on the nearside of the ring, his back to me, but I sensed the fire in him, sudden and hot. Felt the rage that replaced the clinical efficiency that should’ve been the scariest shit he had to offer.
“Fuck.” The curse fell from me and I surged forward, catching Cam’s gaze as alarm filled his dark eyes.
He sees it too.
We both moved fast, but not fast enough. Eric charged and Alexei put himself in the way, taking a punch that made my stomach flip, nausea burning my throat.
No.
Alexei staggered, wheeling, blood spraying from his split lip, and panic gripped me so tight I couldn’t fucking breathe. He smiled again, but it was different to the ice-cold leer he’d started with. This grin was hot and fierce.
Feral.
It was terrifying and the fear in my chest morphed into something else.